


Vernon

by tzzzz



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Class Issues, F/M, Gen, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Loss of Virginity, Misogyny, Racism, Racist Language, Sad, Stiles needs to check his priviledge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2013-11-15
Packaged: 2018-01-01 16:47:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1046198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tzzzz/pseuds/tzzzz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vernon is the kind of name you have to live up to.  This is basically a Boyd character study.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vernon

His father named him Vernon, because he thought it sounded distinguished and because it was a name people wouldn’t forget. It’s something to live up to, his grandmother always says. Vernon doesn’t tell her that he doubts he’ll ever be the kind of exceptional man that deserves an exceptional name. He’s happy that everyone just calls him Boyd. 

***

Alicia disappears when she is seven and Vernon is eleven. Vernon dreams of the ice for years. The dreams hurt them most when they stop, like losing a familiar friend.

Even when he invites flashbacks by taking a job at an ice rink, they don’t come. He still feels the loss and the guilt every time he thinks about it. What hurts is that he doesn’t always remember to think about it.

“Is she dead?” he asks. He means, “did I kill her?”

She’s never found. Despite the posters and the radio pleas and the donations, they don’t find her. The police think she fell through the ice. Frightened parents know she was taken. Clarence says that if she had blonde hair and blue eyes things would be different. While Clarence might be right, Vernon knows better than to dwell on what ifs, no matter how tempting.

She’s alive, Vernon sometimes tells himself late at night. She’s happy.

It’s a beautiful lie.

***

Scott McCall rides the bus every other week for four months in seventh grade. For the first month, he mostly just sits in the back being sullen and pretending to study. The next three months is the only time that Vernon can remember when he looked forward to the ride to school. 

Everyone else has given Vernon a wide berth ever since last year, when the rumor was that Vernon had killed his sister or sold her to the kidnapper or abandoned her at the frozen lake. Vernon had let them think those things. It didn’t seem worth it to try to make his case to everyone - he had only looked away for a second to see why Mr. Saunder’s two huskies were barking, but he’d looked away. It was his fault. 

Scott McCall is brilliantly oblivious to the seven foot radius that most of the other students keep between themselves and Vernon. He doesn’t know if it’s because Scott has too many of his own worries or if he’s just that inobservant. Vernon didn’t have any classes with Scott last year and this year the only class they share is math, which Scott isn’t very good at. Vernon likes the way that Scott doesn’t let being one of the worst students in the class get to him, though, even when they talk behind his back about the stupid kid with the inhaler around his neck. Jackson Whittemore says that it makes sense, because all “beaners” are lazy and stupid. Vernon puts glue in the hairgel he sees Jackson apply every day at lunch.

It takes Vernon a whole week to work up the courage to sit next to Scott, who offers a smile in spite of his sullen mood. Eventually, Vernon offers to help Scott with his math homework and Scott teaches Vernon how to swim in the pond in the woods not far from the bus stop. _Maybe if I had known how to swim, Alicia would have been okay,_ Vernon thinks. Even though he hadn’t seen her go through the ice and the police had never found her body, Vernon thinks that if he’d known how to swim, he might have been able to save her.

***

“Oh, baby, I don’t blame you,” Mom says.

“I know it wasn’t his fault, but. . .” she says.

“The best trucking jobs are in Mississippi,” she tells him. “Clarence’s cousin lives there.”

“Why did God have to take our little girl?” she cries.

When she thinks Vernon isn’t listening: “He’s my son and he’s _still here_ , but I look at him and I remember her. I can’t stop.”

“If I stay in this house, this town, I’ll go crazy.”

“You’re doing so well in school, Vernon. Maybe if you stay here, you’ll have a chance to get into Redwoods Academy.”

“What am I supposed to do? Pop pills? Drink? Or maybe I should start smoking crack? Would that be better? How can I make it better?”

“Am I a bad mother?” she pleads.

“I love you.”

“What did we do wrong?”

“You can visit.”

“It’ll be alright,” she lies.

“I’m pregnant.”

She says, “Goodbye.”

***

“You’re the man of the house now,” Clarence says. He’s smiling, his hand warm on Vernon’s shoulder. “I have to go where the job needs doing, but you’ll be here to take care of your mother and sister, won’t ya?

Vernon is reminded of the day he met Clarence. “What’s up, little man?” Clarence had said. His petite, rail-thin frame had seemed to tower over Vernon then. Vernon is taller than him now. He’ll grow up tall and broad like his father.

“I like your mother very much,” Clarence had mock whispered, a confession loud enough for Vernon’s mom to hear. “I want to come around and make her smile. Will you let me do that, little man?”

Now, looking down into Clarence’s weary eyes, Vernon wonders what would have happened if he had said no. It probably wouldn’t have mattered to Vernon’s mother what Vernon had thought about it. Clarence had a good job. He even had an Associates Degree in Graphic Design, even though he'd never been able to use it. He was soft-spoken and patient. He gave little Kayla Barkley everything he could give her and everything Vernon’s father hadn’t. He was even willing to provide for someone else’s child. Why would it matter what that child thought?

Now, Clarence gives Vernon one final pat on the head and gives his mother a lingering kiss. It’s Alicia that he swings up and twirls round and round, kissing her cheek and promising, “Daddy will be home soon, baby girl. I’ll see you soon.”

He’ll never see her again.

***

Vernon and Scott have been bonding on the bus all semester and sitting together at lunch unless Scott gets dragged over to the table with his fellow Latino students. Vernon doesn’t feel comfortable there. They all use slang that he doesn’t understand and they all seem to know each other just because they’re all Hispanic. Vernon isn’t blind; he knows that there are racial cliques in Beacon Hills. They aren’t gangs and there are black kids who are popular and white kids who aren’t. There are Asians on the football team and the one hispanic girl in Chess Club. But there’s a clandestine, almost unspoken rule that says: if the other groups won’t take you, you can at least spend _some_ time with your own race, even if they don’t like you. It seems supposedly selling your sister to a pedophile is enough to violate that rule, because Vernon can hear Danielle loudly gossiping about him from half across the room. The look she gives him when he approaches her table could melt paint. 

Scott looks pained when he sees Vernon sitting alone and sometimes he’ll even turn the other Latino kids down. Only Anna Cortez smiling at him keeps Scott sitting over there at all, considering he barely speaks Spanish and none of them share Scott’s boundless passion for Mass Effect. Then again, Anna Cortez is beautiful and does gymnastics, so Vernon doesn’t really blame him.

Vernon would ask Scott over, except his house is the house of an old lady, with antique furniture wrapped in plastic, a dish of hard candies on the entryway table, and that smell that Vernon likes to pretend doesn’t exist, except it definitely does.

Scott doesn’t invite Vernon to his father’s apartment, even though he gets dropped off only one stop away from Vernon. Gran says that it’s rude to invite yourself over, so he doesn’t ask why, but he suspects that he wouldn’t like to be invited even if he were. Scott gets on the bus looking tired and angry on the weeks that he’s staying with his dad.

Vernon would like to go over to Scott’s mom’s house, but Scott gets picked up by carpool when he’s staying with his mom - there are no extra seats in Mrs. Chang’s minivan. 

***

Unlike Scott’s, Vernon’s father was never really in the picture. All Scott has to say about that is, “that’s lucky for you.”

Over the period of several months sitting together on the bus, Vernon has learned the following about Scott’s father:

1\. He used to take Scott to see the Giants, a team Scott still loves.  
2\. But he only took him in order to make up for not being around more.  
3\. He’s white, which explains the “McCall.”  
4\. Swear to god, he’s _not_ abusive.  
5\. He rents a shitty apartment just because he has joint custody of Scott, otherwise he’d have no reason to stay in Beacon Hills.  
6\. He had Scott’s mom’s name tattooed over his heart when he was eighteen, but he got it removed because he said guys with tattoos don’t get promoted.  
7\. He’s in the FBI, which Scott used to think is cool, but doesn’t anymore.  
8\. He probably cheated on Scott’s mother.  
9\. That’s not the reason for the divorce.

“Do you like living with him?” Vernon asks.

Scott shrugs and stares intently at the rip in the seat in front of them. “All my stuff’s at our house with Mom, but the judge said that I’m too young to be left alone at night when she’s at work. Dad has a plasma TV and an XBox, though. Stiles does, too, so we can play together over the internet when my dad won’t let me stay over, which he never does. Stiles gets to stay home by himself when his dad has the night shift and he can’t stay with me and my mom, but his mom died instead of got divorced so the judge can’t tell his dad what to do. Hey, do you play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare? You can join our party.”

“Sorry, my Gran won’t let me play violent games.” And even if she did, Vernon doesn’t have a gaming system or an internet connection. He’s not about to tell Scott that, though.

“Oh. That’s okay. Maybe you can come play at Stiles’s house sometime. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

***

If Scott had wanted to dissuade Vernon from ever becoming a werewolf, he shouldn’t have whined about all of the people trying to kill him or argued that Derek just wanted to turn people for his own benefit. All Scott should have done was to tell Vernon that if he took the bite, he’d know more about everyone than he ever wanted to.

Vernon might have been socially ostracized because of what happened to Alicia or because he lives with his grandmother or because he’s poor, but he’s not afraid to admit that he’s also a genuine introvert. He doesn’t like people enough to hold their secrets and as a werewolf, he holds a lot of them.

First, there’s the things he overhears: that Sandy Chang has a crush on Greenberg or that Dave, the cashier at 7-11, watches porn on what people think is a security camera monitor, or that Dana Rutledge is being molested by her uncle. Then there’s the lies people tell. Isaac _did_ deliberately kick a soccer ball into Vernon’s face in sixth grade. Gran _doesn’t_ think Vernon’s mom will ever come back for him. Mr. Smith doesn’t believe the Holocaust happened. The worst is the smell. Ms. Samson smelled pregnant and then she wasn’t anymore. In addition to Lydia Martin, Stiles is turned on by vanilla bodywash, anime, danger and Derek Hale. And of course, there’s the way Coach Finstock smells like he bathed in a vat of papayas. According to Peter, that’s the smell of cancer.

At first, Vernon takes Derek’s advice to act as though he only knows what he could know as a human. Derek had been trained in secrecy since he was a child, but secrecy isn’t Vernon’s way. He thinks about what he learned in JROTC, about the quote: “All it takes for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing.” Mostly he thinks about Isaac and all the pain Vernon could have saved him if he’d just noticed what was wrong. Derek used his superhuman powers to save Isaac, so he couldn’t really stop Vernon from doing the same. 

Vernon isn’t afraid to do what the friend who Dana Rutledge confided in couldn’t, so he reports her uncle’s abuse to the police. He teases Isaac about the lie about the soccer ball and uses his enhanced vision to figure out Mr. Smith’s password and forward some of his more unsavory emails to the school administration. Vernon even leaves a pamphlet about prostate pre-screening on Finstock’s desk. 

Scott would be proud of him, Vernon thinks, for using his newfound power for good.

***

Vernon is excited to meet Scott’s best friend, Stiles. Scott talks about him constantly: how he’s trying to learn how to cook, the time they went to see a Giants game and Stiles lost his drink over the railing and ended up dousing another fan, how his dad is thinking about running for sheriff and isn’t that awesome?

Vernon thinks that Stiles might be another kindred spirit like himself and Scott - someone who knows too much about adult problems and doesn’t quite fit in because of it. Scott met him a year and a half ago when Stiles’s mother was dying of cancer. Scott would get dropped off at the hospital by his carpool to wait while his mother finished her shift and there was this other kid with limbs small and lanky enough to yank things out of the bottom layers of the vending machine. Scott, because he’s Scott, had ignored the tear tracks beneath the kid’s eyes and befriended him.

Stiles used to go to school in Hill Valley, where the special needs program for children with ADHD is located, but according to Scott, he pulled an epic coup with his shrink and guidance counselor in order to force his dad to pull him out of Special Ed and go to the same Middle School as Vernon and Scott next semester. Stiles sounds great, and Vernon could use another friend. 

Scott is excited because Stiles lives near enough to the school that on days when he stays with his mom, they can walk to Stiles’s house and stay until his mom picks him up after work.

Vernon doesn’t think he’ll be able to do the same most days, unless Stiles’s dad or Scott’s mom would drop him home, but he looks forward to it all the same.

As it turns out, there’s only one problem: Vernon really doesn’t like Stiles.

***

“Oh my god, you suck at Call of Duty so hard. It’s like you’ve never even played before,” Stiles says.

 _That’s because I haven’t,_ Vernon doesn’t say.

“My dad says that I can’t have my mom’s old jeep unless I pay for gas myself,” Stiles says. “Where am I supposed to get that kind of money?” 

_A job, like the one I’ve had since I was old enough,_ Vernon doesn’t say.

“It must be nice, having a Dad in the army.”

_It must be nice having a Dad who’s actually around._

“Lydia Martin won’t even look at me,” Stiles moans. “She knows I’ve been in love with her since like third grade. It’s sooooo unfair.”

_As unfair as expecting her to fall in love with you just because you want it?_

“It’s fine. We’re underaged and my dad is a deputy. What’s the worst that could happen?” Stiles asks.

 _I could get shot,_ Vernon doesn’t answer.

“How about we buy all of them. It’s Halloween! We’ll just throw out what we don’t use.”

_Sure, if you pay for it._

“It’s just a B-minus, dude. There are tons of colleges out there that’ll take you with less than straight-As.”

 _Yeah, if you can afford $40,000 a year,_ Vernon doesn’t say.

“So, what’s it like to be black?” Stiles asks.

Vernon ignores him completely.

***

Stiles, Vernon thinks, is the kind of person who could live up to a name like Vernon. Stiles, with his overabundance of personality and the ego to go along with it, could probably even live up to his own birth name, considering that it takes a special kind of person to decide to call himself Stiles when he has a perfectly bland middle name sitting there waiting to be used. According to Scott, he’d even used his first name for years, until his mother died and suddenly her father’s name became sacred.

Vernon can respect that. He can even accept that part of the reason why Stiles is so possessive and protective over Scott is because he’s suffered that kind of loss. But Vernon’s suffered loss, too, and the only way he can push through and keep living his life is by recognizing that it’s his choice how he’ll let it affect him. If Vernon can keep from lashing out from all the pain he’s in, so can Stiles. It isn’t fair to let Stiles skate by being disrespectful and a little mean just because his mother died when there are people like Vernon who fight hard every day just to keep their anger at the world locked inside.

***

“You should join the lacrosse team with us,” Stiles says when he’s waiting for Vernon to bring him a pair of skates. Stiles has happily informed Vernon that he heard that Lydia Martin loves to skate, so he’s staking things out in hopes of running into her. Vernon thinks it’s creepy and that Stiles is an asshole, so he doesn’t tell him that Lydia doesn’t come often and when she does, it’s only on Sunday mornings, when advanced skaters can reserve private rink time.

“No,” Vernon replies, hoping that Stiles will just leave, but it isn’t crowded yet so there’s nobody else waiting. Stiles isn’t actually a very good skater, so he looks for excuses to linger before getting on the ice. Vernon does not appreciate being one of those excuses.

“Come on, Boyd. Scott’s determined to do it, even if we’ll probably spend all year on the bench and I don’t even know how the school district’s lawyers let a kid with severe asthma like his even do sports. Unlike me, you look like you could actually be good.” He looks Vernon up an down for an uncomfortably long time, reaching out to feel Vernon’s bicep through his hoodie. Vernon steps back so that Stiles almost hits his nose against the rental counter when he loses balance. 

Vernon has been working out since last summer and, unlike Stiles, he already has the frame to support it. His dad got him a full set of weights, a bench, a pull-up bar, and a barbell so that he could get a head start on JROTC this year. Vernon’s dad joined the Marines right out of high school. He says that it was in order to support his pregnant girlfriend and their child, but Vernon thinks it was just the coolest way his father could find to run away.

“It doesn’t even matter if you’re good at passing,” Stiles argues. “A guy like you could take _out_ the other team. You’re like built for body checking. The girls will go crazy.” Stiles waggles his eyebrows. It makes him look demented. 

The thing is: Vernon wouldn’t mind being part of something like that. He also wouldn’t mind being a little more popular - not Jackson Whittemore popular, just a little less invisible. He thinks Stiles might be right about being able to make first line. He has no need to doubt the fact that he has better chances than a severe asthmatic and the guy who sprained his wrist a week ago before he even had the skates on.

Stiles grins. “I can see you coming around. It’ll be great.”

Except, if Vernon does lacrosse, he’ll have to stay after and he’ll miss the bus. He doesn’t know anyone on the team, other than theoretically Scott and Stiles, so he wouldn’t be able to get a ride every day and he wouldn’t have time to work the same number of hours and still get done with his homework. There’s also the lacrosse gear, which is really expensive. Vernon’s dad would give him the money in addition to the money he gives Gran for Vernon’s food and school fees, but Vernon has never felt comfortable asking him for things like that. He knows that he’s technically entitled to it, but Vernon has a stronger connection with Mickey Mouse than his father - even asking his father to fly in from DC for Alicia’s funeral had felt like an inappropriate burden to place on his dad, like it might be the straw that broke the camel’s back in terms of his dad giving Vernon anything at all.

He’s already grateful his father got Vernon’s grandmother to take care of him when his mom couldn’t handle even looking at him without crying. She had full custody, so his dad didn’t have to take Vernon off her and Clarence’s hands. 

“No.”

“But it’ll be _awesome_ ,” Stiles whines. “The coach also teaches Econ and Business, so being on the team could help you out, you know, academically.”

Vernon gets straight As. But Stiles doesn’t need to know that. It’s really none of his business until class standings start getting posted junior year. Better to shame them with quiet dignity than with anger, Gran says. Be patient, she says. 

“Seriously, how could you object to this?” Stiles asks. “Lacrosse, Econ, girls, letting Scott live vicariously through you when you make first line. My logic is impeccable and I’m always right.”

Stiles smiles, like he thinks he’s being charming. It’s not charming to hear a spoiled kid who’s been coddled and never told he’s wrong stroke his own ego. It’s not charming that Stiles can’t even imagine Vernon’s reasons, because he’s had the luxury to think ‘I want’ like a child, without ever considering how it might affect anyone else.

“No,” Vernon replies, stony faced.

***

Vernon is in love with Erica and Erica has a giant crush on Stiles, who doesn’t notice, as usual.

“He’s a little weird, too,” Erica says dreamily, laying down on the bleachers with her head in Vernon’s lap. Vernon shifts uncomfortably, because he has a beautiful girl’s head in his lap and he doesn’t want to twitch wrong and make her think that it isn’t safe to be his friend. “I mean, he’s no Jackson Whittemore. None of the other girls really notice him, so I might actually have a chance.”

Vernon rolls his eyes, happy Erica can’t see him do it. The other girls notice Stiles, alright, but unlike Erica, they notice him in a bad way. It’s not that Stiles isn’t entertaining or that he’s even that bad looking. It’s that he’s so completely unaware. Stiles Stilinski lives in a world where he’s the hero of the story and everyone else is playing the bit parts: Lydia Martin is the damsel in distress (though Vernon has never met anyone in less distress), Scott McCall is the sidekick, his dead mother is the angst that drives the story and his father is the mentor to be outgrown. Jackson Whittemore is probably the enemy, because he’s everyone’s enemy, and Erica and Vernon are extras with a few inconsequential lines.

Vernon hates that Erica feels low enough that she cast herself as the sidekick in someone else’s story. Even Vernon, who sits alone and cannot live up to the promise of his name, has his own challenges to overcome and his own villains to defeat. It may not be a story like the Batman comics that Erica is obsessed with, but it’s _his_ story and nobody else’s. 

The problem is that Erica won’t listen to Vernon when he tells her that she can be a hero all on her own. “You don’t want someone who thinks he wants Lydia Martin,” Vernon says, because in the very least, Erica should be able to see that it’s not Lydia that Stiles actually wants. He wants the idea of the popular girl hanging off his arm, because in his fantasy world, that’s winning the award he thinks he deserves.

Erica frowns. “If I didn’t have the seizures and I didn’t have to take this stupid medication, I could be like Lydia Martin. I could be _sexy_ and then he’d want me.”

Is that all she aspires to? Erica is already a million times better than that. She’s sweet and funny and she has her own opinions about things that aren’t based around what other people think. “If you were in Lydia Martin’s shoes, you wouldn’t want him,” Vernon argues.

Erica snorts. “I wouldn’t want Jackson Whittemore either. He’s gorgeous, I’ll give him that, but you’d have to actually put up with him. Besides,” she looks up at Vernon coyly, “I couldn’t like someone who said those things to you.” Vernon regrets ever telling Erica about that.

“If you were Lydia Martin,” Vernon argues, “you and me wouldn’t be friends.”

Erica laughs, sitting up to give Vernon a hug, “you’ll always be my friend, Boyd. Even if I magically got hot and popular, I wouldn’t forget you.”

***

Vernon has thought Erica Reyes is beautiful since the first time he saw her in homeroom the first day of his freshman year. She has some acne and doesn’t wear makeup or smooth out her hair from its frizzy blonde mane. She wears loose, elastic clothes and seems to melt into her desk for fear of drawing attention to herself. But her big brown eyes are sly, if always a little dazed, and Vernon likes the way she moves with intention. There’s no flouncing or hair twirling or nervous tapping when it comes to Erica. It’s like she thinks out her every move in advance.

Vernon learns the reason for it later when he hears a shout during the middle of Iron Man 2 and the lights flip on to reveal Erica in the throes of a seizure. Vernon stands there gawking, unsure how to help. Luckily, Erica is with her mother, who keeps the crowd back, masters all her panic and worry and fear and sweeps her daughter away.

Vernon walks to the library the next day to look up epilepsy on the public computers. He has an ancient laptop for school work, but Gran won’t get internet service installed at the house. He learns to not put anything in the epileptic person’s mouth, about strategies to control the seizures, medications and their side-effects, when to call an ambulance, and a lot about the kind of stigma epileptics face.

The next day, during homeroom, Vernon gets up the courage to sit next to Erica and ask if she’s okay. She is, but she seems embarrassed to know that he saw. Not really knowing what to do, he asks if it was the movie that caused the seizure.

“I’m not a photosensitive epileptic,” Erica says, “but even if I were, it’s Iron Man. Completely worth it.” She doesn’t smile very often, but seeing that smile, Vernon wishes she would.

***

“Was it worth it?” Erica says, sitting on the cold floor of the bank vault and longing for the moon. “Maybe it would’ve gotten better, like they say. I’d always be epileptic, but two months of being the hot girl isn’t worth two months trapped in here.”

“I don’t know,” Vernon replies. Because without the bite, Erica never would have kissed him. He never would have had Isaac or Derek or felt like he was doing any _good_ for anybody. He wouldn’t have felt the power of the moonlight on his skin or finally gotten to play on the lacrosse field.

It had always been a Faustian bargain. He knew it from the moment Erica walked up to him, as gorgeous on the outside as Vernon had always seen the girl within. Scott didn’t need to tell him that it wouldn’t end well, but Vernon wanted Erica. He wanted to be like Scott and be the brother that showed Derek that he’s not alone. He wanted to be a part of something and he’d sold his soul for it. 

They’re probably going to die. Vernon would be okay with that, except he can’t imagine Erica, beautiful, brilliant Erica, coming to an end in a dark, dirty cell like this.

***

“We can’t just leave, Erica,” Vernon pleads. “What about you mom? What about my gran?”

“Boyd, if we stay here, we’ll be slaughtered. You saw that thing! And the hunters. They aren’t ever going to stop.”

“Derek says we’re stronger as a pack. We’ll die alone. Weren’t you listening? The triskelion: alpha, beta, omega--”

“Derek is full of shit!” Erica snarls, her yellow eyes popping. “Derek just wanted to be king of a little gang, so he can act out his many, many psychological problems. He’s sadistic and crazy. We don’t have to follow him just because he’s alpha.”

“He gave you the bite.”

“And he _lied_ about what it would be like. He said I’d be strong and beautiful and I wouldn’t have to hurt, and look at what he gave us: more pain. It isn’t what I signed up for. What good are all those things if I don’t live to my next birthday? If I want the life he promised, I have to take it.”

Vernon hates her for a second. He hates that she’s only looking out for herself. He hates that she wants to betray someone who gave them this gift, even if it is a twisted one. More than anything he hates her naivety, her lusting, entitled belief that Derek would just ride in and make everything better for no reason at all. How could she ever have thought that she could just have health and beauty and acceptance without paying a price? How can she think that she can just skip the bill now that it’s come due?

“Come with me,” she pleads. Her lips are painted cherry red and her eyes are big and beautiful. “If you come with me, I won’t be an omega. We’ll be our own pack. We won’t make the mistakes that Derek does.”

“We don’t know anything about being werewolves. We need--”

“Then we’ll find some other ones.”

“If we leave, Derek and Scott are going to die fighting this thing,” Vernon argues. 

“That’s their choice. Vernon, we have to think of ourselves. Are you really going to let me go off by myself just so you can go down fighting with _him_?”

That’s their sin, he realizes later, when she’s dead and he’s about to be. When they were humans, individuality had been all they wanted, but wolves are pack. The deal with the devil hadn’t been beauty for persecution. It had been pack for individuality. For a wolf, bound by the rules of wolves, betraying the pack could not go unpunished by fate. 

***

“Vernon?” Erica asks. It’s small and scared and not at all like her. She’s never even used his first name. 

He nods to acknowledge her. His throat is dry. The alphas haven’t given them anything to eat or drink in days, but they’re werewolves, so they survive. Vernon’s still sweating even. They must be able to make moisture in a way normal humans can’t. It would at least explain how quickly Derek always seems to recover from catastrophic blood loss.

She clasps his hand in hers, pursing her lips. “I agreed to this so I could be the prettiest girl in school and that was great and everything, but I’m still going to die a virgin.”

“You don’t have to,” he says and Erica smiles, leaning towards him. “I meant that you don’t have to die,” he clarifies.

That just makes her chuckle, pressing her lips to his. They’re not even chapped.

It isn’t Vernon’s first kiss. He was in third grade and Jayni Smith pulled him behind the bushes during recess. He thinks half the class snuck in behind them to watch. It was more humiliating than exhilarating. He’d also gotten to second base once at a house party one of the ROTC juds threw. The girl had wanted more, but Vernon turned her down because he wanted his first time to at least be with someone who would remember his name in the morning. Then there was the time when he got a scholarship to math camp and Danny Malehani kissed him while they were swimming in the lake. Vernon pushed him away and they haven’t talked since. Now that he’s going to die, Vernon feels really bad about that. He wishes he had the chance to apologize, to say that he’s not some homophobic asshole. He just couldn’t stand to be _gay_ on top of everything else.

He leans back against a row of safety deposit boxes, letting Erica pull off her pants and unzip his before she settles into his lap. They don’t take their tops off. Even this much makes Vernon feel raw and vulnerable.

He looks into her eyes and she’s so, so beautiful. A part of him thrills know that he’s the one who gets to have this. Everyone at school looked at her and _wanted_ , but it’s quiet, shy, loner Vernon who gets to be the one to have her. He stayed by her side and he never dared hope, but now he’s being rewarded. But even as he’s thrilling with victory, a part of him knows that Erica isn’t a prize to be won and this dark, claustrophobic cell is no winner’s circle. They are here and Vernon will take what is offered, but he knows its no better than curling up on Erica’s childish pink sheets would have been, running his fingers through her messy mane and being delicate in deference of her seizures. It would have been better in a sunlit bedroom, because she loved him and not because they’re about to die.

Erica is a good kisser, far dirtier than Vernon would have ever imagined. She practically devours his mouth, refusing to give him control for even a second. They were both probably hoping that they could just stay in this position, but it’s hard to get the right leverage when he has to lean far enough away from the wall to give Erica the space to put her knees. They end up in missionary, probably like all virgins, and even though she cups his face and looks at him with more love than Vernon had ever in his wildest dreams imagined, it’s still awkward. Erica still winces in pain and there’s still blood. He still slips out a few times trying to find the right angle and comes far too quickly and before she does. She guides his fingers to her clit in order to get herself off, but he still vows to himself that he’ll be better next time.

Only there is no next time, because the next day, Cora arrives, and after that, Erica dies.

***

When Vernon comes back to himself, he’s screaming Erica’s name.

“Boyd,” Isaac says. His hands are clammy where they grip Vernon’s. “It’s okay. You’re safe. Boyd, you’re safe.”

Isaac is as innocent-looking and baby-faced as ever, like one of those cherubs painted on the ceiling of a European chapel. Vernon doesn’t know much about Isaac. He and Erica had wondered about him back before the bite, of course. Erica had met him at the office of the school nurse more than enough times to be suspicious and Vernon always kept an eye on the other outcasts. He’d steered clear of Isaac only because it seemed as though Isaac _wanted_ to be alone. He took off immediately after school, shied away from the other students, and would make small talk readily enough but clam up whenever Vernon tried to get to know him.

Once they got to know him, both Vernon and Erica wanted to kick themselves for not realizing. In retrospect, Isaac had the abuse written all over him if anyone had bothered to take the time to look.

“You’re okay,” Isaac gasps. He’s saying it to himself as much as he’s saying it to Vernon.

Vernon’s not okay. He was trapped in a bank vault for three months. He saw Erica die. He almost killed Cora, the itch of the isolation from the moon was so great. Scott had to stop him from murdering two little children. He’d slashed Derek to shreds. Oh god, Derek.

“Derek?”

“He’s okay,” Isaac replies. “He stayed behind to help some teacher who was locked in the basement with you.”

“But we--” It was betrayal, pure and simple.

“He’ll heal,” Isaac says. His hands are a clammy, empty comfort where they clasp Vernon’s.

***

“I need to talk to her,” Vernon protests. “I have to explain.”

Isaac and Derek share a look. Vernon hates that the rest of his pack can now communicate with just a look and he’s out of the loop. He’s alone again. Why did he ever think he deserved more?

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Derek says.

“Erica died and I was there. She needs to know what happened to her daughter or she’ll keep hoping. Or she’ll think she’s alive somewhere being raped or tortured. I don’t have to tell her about werewolves. She just needs to know.”

Vernon can’t look them in the eyes. Maybe Derek can understand. He did live on the edge of hope when it came to Peter. But it isn’t the same. Vernon thinks about Alicia. Is she dead? Was it a quick death by ice or was she taken and destroyed by some predator? It would be better, he knows, so much better, to just know she died and that she’s at peace now.

Derek’s hand is firm on Vernon’s arm. “I know you want to talk to her, but you can’t. Erica is dead and her mom is grieving, but you, me, and Isaac are still alive. We don’t have an explanation for what happened. All three of us have probably left evidence on the body.”

“I won’t tell her about the body. I’ll just tell her that Erica’s dead. She knows we were friends.” Erica used to invite Vernon to her house sometimes. Mrs. Reyes _knows_ him.

Isaac and Derek share another look.

This time it’s Isaac who speaks, “Boyd, you can’t. After . . . I went to talk to her. She thinks you kidnapped Erica. She says that you did something to your sister and you did something to Erica, too. It’ll look even worse now that you’re back and Erica’s not.”

Vernon chokes on his response. Someone thinks he’d hurt _Erica_? He loved Erica more than anything. Yeah, he knew that her mother never approved of their friendship. Because Vernon was a boy and because he was _black_ , but he thought that Mrs. Reyes had at least gotten to know Vernon well enough to know that he was a nerdy, shy kid who panted after Erica like a puppy dog, not the gang banger that she initially imagined him to be. She’d even started baking him desserts to take home towards the end, when she realized how much he liked even the gluten-free cookies she made for Erica’s epilepsy diet. 

“There’s no evidence to support any of it,” Derek states, as though that’s supposed to make the fact that Erica’s parents thinks Vernon _murdered_ her any better. “The police will probably question you, but the Argents cleaned out the vault. They can’t prove anything.”

“It’s because I’m black, isn’t it?”

Isaac and Derek look at each other. Vernon has never seen Derek looked so scared, not even when he’s been facing down an group of hunters and a kanima. Vernon would laugh, except it makes him want to cry.

“No?” Derek tries.

Isaac looks down at his hands shyly. Vernon stares at him until he looks up. “She, um, may have said something about you taking her baby girl off to, um-- Pimp?” Isaac squeaks. “That’s not really racist, right? I mean, white people smoke crack too?”

Vernon reminds himself that Isaac was verbally and physically abused. His mother abandoned him and he lost a sibling also. Vernon doesn’t have a monopoly on pain and Isaac can sympathize better than most. And he _tries_ to understand.

Except Erica’s mother thinks that Vernon kidnapped her daughter and turned her out for crack and even though he didn’t, it feels almost worse than anything he’s ever felt - even getting shot full of arrows by his classmate or being tortured by Deucalion. Only Erica actually _dying_ is worse. He growls and throws a punch that Derek catches easily before it hits Isaac square on the jaw.

“I’m sorry,” Derek says.

“That doesn’t make it better.”

“I know,” Derek replies. Vernon realizes suddenly, that Derek probably thinks about being a werewolf as a kind of analogy for racism. In a way, Derek has the creds. He’s experienced racial persecution ala Ku Klux Klan circa 1870, fire in the middle of the night and all, but it’s still not good enough. On the outside, Derek still looks like a white middle class ‘bad boy’ whose greatest crime might be to join a boy band. Even when he was wanted for murder, he could have gone into a convenience store late at night in a hoodie without people tensing up. As an older, unemployed man squatting in a train depot, hanging around mostly with high schoolers, nobody probably ever questioned whether Derek was pimping them out. And Isaac … nobody has probably ever even suspected Isaac of not putting the toilet seat down.

He lets another fist fly and Derek lets this one hit him. It just reminds Vernon of the moon, the desire to kill, how he’d almost skinned his friend alive. That’s enough to instantly chill the rage.

“It’s not fair,” he whimpers. Having more power just makes him feel all the more impotent when the world refuses to bend to his will.

“I know,” is all Derek can offer.

Before Vernon knows it, he’s on the floor, crying into the soft fabric of Derek’s shirt with Isaac pacing in the background, whining like a puppy dog.

After who knows how long like that, Derek stands and offers Vernon his hand. They shift and run through the woods to the place where Isaac and Scott buried her. There’s a single wolfsbane plant at the head of the grave. “Allison,” Derek explains.

Vernon growls, because the last time they saw each other, Allison had shot Erica full of arrows. Erica wouldn’t have wanted Allison anywhere near her. 

“We couldn’t do it,” Derek says. “It had to be a human.”

Why not Erica’s mother? Why not Deaton? Why not _Stiles_? Why her?

“It’s a special strain,” Derek continues. “It protects the spirit into the afterlife. A human has to plant it so that the spirit stays connected to its humanity even in death. Hunters who follow the code do it as a sign that they respect the humanity in a wolf, even when it’s gone ‘rabid.’” He spits the words, but Vernon can see that Derek’s bought into it, at least somewhat. 

“And so that our kind can’t get at the body,” Peter adds, materializing suddenly out of the trees in a way that Isaac has informed Vernon is frighteningly common for him. “No unwanted reanimation.”

He’s holding a silver bottle that looks like he might have found it in an antique store. 

“What’s that?” Isaac asks.

“Wolfsbane-laced wine,” Peter replies. “This _is_ an informal wake, right?”

Vernon was unaware that any such thing had been planned and Isaac and Derek look equally baffled, but when Peter hands Vernon the bottle, he drinks. It’s thick and cloying, so much worse that the nips of gran’s gin that Vernon has previously tried.

“Thanks,” he says.

The others follow suit and then, without prompting, they all lean their heads back and howl.

***

“You do realize that he’s trying to kill himself, right?” Vernon says to Isaac when Isaac comes to him to complain about Derek having kicked him out. He would invite Isaac to stay with him, except he’s on thin ice enough with his gran as it is. It doesn’t matter that Isaac inherited everything from his father and could more than afford to pay his own way - Vernon, now a delinquent, is considered charity case enough.

“What?” Isaac says.

They’ve both been loners, but sometimes Vernon wonders if Isaac was literally raised by wolves. 

“It isn’t about you. I mean, it’s not about him trying to hurt you. He probably thinks he’s protecting you.”

“What do you mean?” Isaac asks, looking desperate to believe something, _anything_ other than Derek just didn’t want him anymore. 

“These people want to kill Derek, but normally in order to kill an alpha you’d have to go through his pack first. He’s pushing us away so that they don’t go through us to get to him.”

“But what do you mean he wants to kill himself?”

Vernon shakes his head. Vernon has been alone for a long time, but he reads. He watches people. He knows that everyone’s inner world must be at least as complicated as his own. For all the things he’s been through, Isaac is still so stuck in his teenage mantra of ‘me, me, me.’ “You were there. You saw him. He just locked himself in there with me and Cora. We were going to kill him and when the sun rose, he looked disappointed that we didn’t succeed.”

“He was saving Ms. Blake. That’s heroic, not suicidal,” Isaac replies. Isaac is an idiot.

“He doesn’t want to die just to die,” Vernon replies. “He just doesn’t think his life is worth anything. He’d trade it for _anything_. You’ve seen it. You’re just in denial.”

“I’m not.”

Vernon stares, skeptically.

“Okay, fine. What are _we_ supposed to do about it? An intervention? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but not only is Derek not exactly Mr. Touchy-Feely, but he’s been a giant dick to all of us. He knows better than anyone how miserable this life is and he still bit us. Maybe he deserves whatever the alphas want to do to him.”

“Did you ever consider that maybe he was lonely?” Vernon asks. Vernon had been so grateful for the pack, for even Derek’s taciturn company and Derek had lost so much. Vernon’s not sure he would’ve done any different if he were in Derek’s shoes.

Isaac’s stupid cherubic face just stares blankly for longer than Vernon thinks it should take to process the sentiment. Then again, maybe when Vernon was praying some anchor, some greater purpose to make his life worth living, Isaac had always been praying to just be left alone.

“Okay, so what do we do about it?” Isaac asks. “I still think an intervention will go over about as well as another funeral. He’ll probably break my wrist again, man.”

“You’re right.”

“So no intervention. What’s the plan?”

“We don’t let him.”

“What?”

“We don’t let him kill himself,” Vernon repeats. “We train and we fight with everything we have so that he never has the opportunity to sacrifice himself for us.”

“That seems difficult,” Isaac says.

Vernon slices his claws across that stupid cherubic face. It’s even more satisfying than he imagined.

***

If Vernon could have an older brother, he’d want him to be like Derek. Vernon is more than aware of Derek Hale’s many flaws. Scott hates him for turning Vernon and the others; Erica hates him for being a “cock tease,” among other things; and even Vernon can see that Derek makes a lot of questionable decisions.

But the thing about Derek that Vernon has come to know in his short time as part of his pack is that when Derek loves someone (and he loves his pack, even if he doesn’t show it), he loves them with all his heart. It’s not rational, and Vernon can tell Derek has been burned more than once, which is why he tries to keep it all bottled in, but Derek can’t seem to help himself.

Every other person in Vernon’s life who is supposed to love him has always loved him conditionally. His father loves him three to five days a year when he has leave and isn’t spending it out on the town with the squad. His mother loves him, so long as she doesn’t have to see his face and be reminded of how he let her daughter die. Clarence probably never loved him, but if he did, it was only so long as Vernon stayed unobtrusive and obedient. Even Gran, who does her best to care for her only son’s only child, doesn’t love Vernon enough to sell her too-big mausoleum of a house to help pay for Vernon to go to college.

It’s Derek, with his silly leather jackets and serious rage issues, who tells Vernon to run away to tend to his wounds and leave him with the odds against him. It’s Derek who would kill or die for Vernon, who has already offered to use some of his inheritance to send Vernon to college, whose love Vernon will never doubt. 

Derek is an idiot to put so much into a kid he barely knows, but Vernon will gladly take it.

Later, trapped in that vault and prepared to die, Vernon realizes that Derek is probably the worst person to be built that way, considering what seems to happen to the people he loves. Still, even after watching the life drain from Erica’s eyes, Vernon clings to the knowledge, deep down in the part that never left Derek’s pack, regardless of the physical distance, that Derek will come for him.

That’s what true brothers do.

***

The day he saunters into the ice rink at Erica’s behest is not the first time Vernon met Derek Hale. Vernon remembers Derek well, though he’s sure Derek doesn’t remember him. Vernon isn’t sure Derek remembers much of anything before the fire, though he’s never asked. Vernon wouldn’t like Derek to ask him about Alicia, so he lets it go.

Derek was a big deal when Vernon was young. He made the varsity basketball team as a freshman and he’s good-looking and smart and popular. At age ten, Vernon could already tell that. Looking back, Vernon is pretty sure that Derek had been a bit of a bully, considering the wary deference other kids his age gave to him. 

As part of a fundraising effort, the high school basketball team puts on a two week skills clinic for kids. Vernon is technically too young, but he’s always been big for his age, and he’s also pretty sure the rickety old coach is operating under the assumption that all black kids are good at basketball. Vernon isn’t good at basketball, but Clarence had to take a truck driving job when the town’s sawmill closed and Vernon’s mom is taking extra shifts at the grocery store because they had to go into debt when Clarence was looking for work. The price to be taught basketball by a handful of high school students is a lot better than camp or hiring a babysitter and Vernon can’t go to stay with Clarence’s brother’s family like Alicia because he’s a boy. A few years later, Vernon realizes that it has nothing to do with Clarence’s brother’s three daughters and everything to do with the fact that he isn’t Clarence’s kid.

The other “coaches” mostly ignore Vernon, once they realize that his increased height and reach don’t help him actually handle the ball. Vernon is happy because running fruitlessly around the basketball court is at least better than summer camp at the Y, but then Derek Hale, Beacon High’s star forward, pulls him aside and says that he probably just hit a growth spurt and all he needs is a little help adjusting to his longer limbs. “You’ll outgrow the clumsy period,” Derek says. They go outside to the mini court on the playground instead of in the gym with the rest of the kids. 

“You play outside of school, right?” Derek asks.

“Not really.” Vernon had asked Clarence to play with him, but he’s too busy. Sometimes he’ll play at a friend’s house, but Vernon would rather stay inside and read than go out and shoot hoops in the backyard by himself.

“Okay,” Derek looks a little surprised, but he covers it with a smile. “You got all that stuff about technique we were showing you back in there. I can tell. You’re smart. You just need practice. _Fun_ practice. So we’ll play one-on-one.”

“You’ll kill me,” Vernon blurts out. “It wouldn’t be fair.”

Derek grins mischievously. “I’ll give myself a handicap, okay? I have to practice using my senses, anyhow.” He pulls out a bandana and ties it around his eyes.

“You’re joking,” Vernon says.

Derek pulls the bandana up just enough to wink before pulling it back down. 

Derek makes his first basket when Vernon is standing there shocked, wondering how Derek manages to not fall flat on his face, let alone handle the ball.

“What are you waiting for, kid?” Derek asks.

They play together for the rest of the afternoon. With Derek wearing the blindfold, they’re actually pretty evenly matched and Vernon ends up winning.

“So,” Derek says, panting, “do you think you’re ready to go out for basketball?”

“No,” Vernon replies honestly. He’s pretty sure he’ll never practice. “But I had fun.”

Derek frowns a little, but concedes. “Well, at least you had fun. I think you’d have fun if you kept working at it, but if you want to bring a book or something you’d rather do, I won’t tell your mom.”

When he looks back on the day later, Vernon thinks Derek probably should have pushed him to work at it or put him on a team with some of the better boys to force him to socialize, or in the very least pretended to _try_ , but Vernon remembers that as the first day that someone listened to Vernon’s wishes like he was an adult. It was a good day.

***

“Good,” Derek says, after Vernon claws a hole deep enough in his side to expose his ribs. He looks almost surprised to have given a compliment. Isaac and Erica have been fighting on instinct, but Vernon has been looking at martial arts videos on the internet and focusing on the drills he learned in JROTC. He stops worrying about speed so that he can step back and really analyze the situation.

Derek himself is an instinctual fighter with no style Vernon can discern. He’s half animal, half bar brawler, relying mostly on strength rather than tactics. He could probably benefit hugely from even a basic karate class, but he’s astoundingly athletic and he inhabits his body in a way that Vernon only dreams of achieving. Derek’s teaching method also leaves a lot to be desired. Since he doesn’t understand any of the theory behind fighting and doesn’t seem aware enough of his own actions to be able to make specific suggestions on form, he just settles for kicking their asses until they hopefully learn something.

“You’ve really dedicated yourself to this, haven’t you?” Derek says. He sounds a little astounded. “I’m happy at least one of you is taking this seriously.”

Vernon shrugs. There’s a venomous killer lizard on the loose out there, why wouldn’t he take it seriously? 

“I’ve done some research, too,” he adds, hoping for approval. There’s not a lot of research he can do with no internet connection at home, but he does check out as many books on the supernatural and the mystical as he can, even spends an afternoon in the infuriatingly incense-heavy New Age bookstore in town. 

“Stiles is the research guy,” Derek says, even though Stiles isn’t even part of the pack. “And Peter. I need you to focus on getting better at fighting. This thing is powerful and I need good soldiers at my side.”

Derek looks like he might say more, but he ends up just squeezing Vernon’s shoulder. It’s awkward, but Vernon feels his chest swell with pride. Isaac and Erica are out on some errand that Derek hasn’t bothered to tell Vernon about, and Vernon is a little disappointed that they aren’t here to witness Vernon being Derek’s best student. 

***

At first, Vernon joins JROTC because he’s expected to. It’ll help him get an ROTC scholarship to college and then he can be an officer, instead of just an enlisted man like his dad, who joined out of high school. 

He certainly doesn’t want to end up like Clarence, a good little worker bee who gets laid off of every job he’s ever had and then claims it’s because he’s black, never because he just isn’t good enough. Or maybe he just doesn’t fight hard enough. He just rolls over and lets some racist fire him, lets them think he’s lazy, takes his licks and moves on to the next. 

Vernon doesn’t want to be like that. He wants to be like his dad and _do something_ , _mean something_ , be a part of something the people can’t exclude him from. The military is probably in his blood, because he loves it. Working together on a team, where your fellow soldier will lay down his life for yours, fighting for a higher cause, those things are right and good. 

The one problem is that Vernon doesn’t know if he’s officer material. He’s smart and he does really well with strategy practicals. He’s read all the great books by generals and soldiers: heroes and terrified drafted grunts and special forces. He’s read everyone from Sun Tzu to Philip Caputo to von Clausewitz to Hemingway (though there’s no strategy advice offered there). But book knowledge isn’t enough.

A book can teach him what to respect in a leader, not how to become one. How could he inspire a platoon when he can’t even make any friends? How could he protect them when he couldn’t even protect a seven-year-old girl? Vernon wouldn’t trust himself to make decisions with the lives of others on the line. He could follow orders, though. He’ll follow orders even if he doesn’t believe in them.

He knows that Derek isn’t a good leader. Once again, Vernon fails to protect the people he loves, this time because he doesn’t trust himself enough to object.

***

The first full moon feels like pure unadulterated power, liberation from the weight of human expectations. It’s all hazy images and rage. It’s the rage that Vernon has never been allowed to admit to. Rage at his father for abandoning him. Rage at his mother for moving on. Rage at Clarence for never caring enough, about anything. Rage at God for taking his sister. Rage at himself for letting it happen. He’s surprised that he even feels rage at Gran for making him work and not getting internet and forcing him to be grateful even though she makes his life more difficult than it needs to be. He isn’t surprised by his rage at assholes who everyone adores, like Jackson Whittemore, and people who shut him out and don’t even know it, like Stiles Stilinski, or at the girls who whisper and tease their friends about wanting him, like the very act of seeing him as human is a curse. There’s a part of him that’s angry at white people, for slavery and racism and subtle oppression and privilege. He doesn’t look at that part too closely, even as a wolf.

“My anchor is anger,” Derek says, far off. Vernon wants to laugh. Anger is the opposite of control.

He tries to rip Derek’s face off.

***

Vernon tells Derek that his anchor is the pack and the way being a part of something makes him feel.

Derek’s smile looks shaky, like he’s out of practice.

“That’s great,” Derek says, throwing an arm over Vernon’s back and giving his shoulder a quick squeeze. “That was my anchor, too, when I was young.”

It’s only later, when Derek hands him a book on supernatural symbology, that Vernon understands. Derek’s anchor isn’t actually anger. It’s the desire for revenge. The only problem with that is the fact that the only person still alive who was involved in the fire is Derek himself. What good will vengeance do him then?

***

When Vernon looks down, glassy-eyed, at Derek’s distraught face, he doesn’t really know what to say. He’s dying. That much is obvious. His sister is dead, the love of his life and his best friend is dead, his mother abandoned him and his father doesn’t care. Even Gran is getting twisted by age. She loves Vernon, but she’s slipping so much that sometimes he’s not sure she remembers him. The person who probably cares the most about Vernon in all the world is looking up at him, like he’s the one with his guts spilling out into a room filled with water. 

Vernon thinks about what he wanted in life: to graduate, to get out of Beacon Hills, to do some good in the world, to learn something, to fall in love, have a family one day, have a _life_. It’s not going to happen and Vernon isn’t really okay with that. In fact, he’s angry. It isn’t _fair_ , even though he knows he asked for too much. He knew the deal was bad from the beginning, but he wanted for too much, coveted things above his station, out of his place. He was too ambitious, trying to live up to a name and an idea that he never deserved in the first place. 

“It’s okay,” he says. It’s not. It’s not okay that Derek wanted power, that he felt alone so he reached out and bit three teenagers without telling them the risks. It’s not okay that Vernon, who studied and worked hard and had a real shot at a good future, has to die as a pawn in a battle he shouldn’t even know about. It’s not okay that Vernon hatched a plan, a good one, to save Derek’s life and it failed for no apparent reason. It’s not okay that Vernon was never the hero of this story, that his death will mean no more than a turning point in the story of Derek, the story of Scott. It’s not okay that Vernon is seventeen and dying. It’s not okay that Erica is already dead.

“It’s not,” Derek sobs, like he doesn’t even know that Vernon isn’t the important one here, never has been.

“It’s okay, Derek,” Vernon argues.

The tears are streaming down Derek’s face and his hands are shaking where they grip Vernon’s and with not much left to lose, Vernon knows what his final sacrifice must be: he has to give it his all to convince Derek that it’s okay, that none of this is his fault (devil with a deal, though he may be). Vernon will not be another source of the destructive self-hatred that he knows will eventually kill this person who he has come to care about. 

It’s not okay, but Vernon had told Isaac that he wouldn’t let Derek kill himself. 

“It was worth it,” he lies.

***

“Where do you think you’re headed, boy?” Gran says.

“Out,” Vernon replies. It’s not like he can tell her that he’s headed to an abandoned train depot to practice fighting under the tutelage of a former murder suspect.

Gran narrows her eyes. She’s 79, but she doesn’t miss much. “How you gonna get there?”

“I’ll walk.”

Gran laughs - they live in a subdivision on the outskirts of town, pressed right up against the woods. That’s good for Vernon, because he can shift and run. But it’s a thirty minute walk to the nearest city bus stop and that bus only runs until 8:30. “Don’t think I don’t know about you.”

Vernon freezes. Gran gets things, but even she couldn’t get _werewolves_. “Mindy, who sells me scratchers, says she’s seen you around town with that Hale boy. His family died, you know.”

“I _know_ , Gran.” Derek doesn’t like to talk about it and now Vernon feels uncomfortable by proxy.

“The papers said he killed that woman in the woods.”

“That was an animal attack. It was his sister and he had to find the body.”

Gran reaches out an arthritic hand to pat Vernon’s. They don’t have to talk about the parallels. Her dark eyes scrutinize him, before she finally sighs. “Be careful, Vernon. Remember what your father told you.”

“Be careful. Don’t do anything suspicious. Don’t step out of line. They will shoot you,” Vernon repeats. He thinks about the supple black leather jacket Derek bought him, about gathering in front of a rich white girl’s house in order to kill her (for being a giant murderous lizard, though the police certainly wouldn’t make that distinction).

Let them shoot me, he thinks. If his eyes glow yellow, Gran’s cataract-covered vision misses it. 

***

Vernon doesn’t mind that they might have to kill Jackson. Even if Jackson isn’t aware of it, he’s killed five people already and he’ll kill more. He isn’t a civilian casualty. He’s an enemy combatant.

Vernon doesn’t think too much about the sick sense of satisfaction he gets when Derek tells him that Jackson rejected the bite. Jackson was _unworthy_ of it, according to Vernon. It feels good to see Jackson finally not get everything he wants. In retrospect, he should have stopped to wonder what Derek was doing biting Jackson at all.

***

When Vernon is in Eighth Grade, he wins the school science fair. His project isn’t the most technically brilliant - that would be Lydia’s invention of an all-natural nail polish remover. It isn’t the most creative - Stiles and Scott’s completely unsuccessful (and dangerous) attempt at making Greek fire and the accompanying video of Stiles burning Scott’s eyebrows off. Vernon’s project is a solid, if not particularly interesting, study of soil types and electrical conductivity. He doesn’t think it’s better than Danny and Jackson’s very polished analysis of magnetic currents and solar radiation.

But Vernon wins and Lydia comes in second, with Danny and Jackson finishing third. Vernon’s dad even calls to congratulate him on the win and he goes to bed with a smile.

Of course, that small sliver of happiness can only last so long, because the next day in the hallway before lunch, Jackson Whittemore is standing in front of his locker with that awful smirk on his face. Jackson is probably in the best shape of any kid in their class and is the star of every single sports team, but Vernon hit his growth spurt early and has probably six inches and 50 lbs on Jackson, so Vernon has no idea what Jackson actually plans to do. He just knows that Jackson doesn’t need physical violence to be dangerous. It’s his _untouchability_ that makes him so.

Vernon sees what it is when he approaches: Jackson has taken Vernon’s posterboard and drawn a picture of a gorilla in a labcoat over the top of it in black sharpie. Vernon has never wanted to punch someone in their smug, stupid face any more than right now, but he knows better. Even though some kids sometimes get off for fighting if it’s provoked (Jackson himself, for example), Vernon won’t be that lucky. He’ll be suspended, or worse, expelled, thanks to Jackson’s father. Then he won’t be able to join JROTC and he won’t be able to get a scholarship to college and then he’ll never go into the Air Force and make something of himself. He end up a resentful, spineless nobody like Clarence.

“He’s just being a sore loser,” Stiles offers dumbly from where he’s appeared in a flail of limbs, as though Vernon doesn’t already know that. Everyone standing there gawking knows that Jackson is just upset that he didn’t win. Everyone knows that Jackson is an entitled asshole who is so spoiled by his rich parents that he’ll throw a tantrum whenever he doesn’t get his way, but they let him be king of the school’s social ladder anyway. They’re all too afraid to say anything, because everyone knows that kids like Jackson should be popular. That’s the natural order and everyone’s too scared to disturb it.

Vernon included. He just pushes past the crowd, ignoring Stiles’s scared look - a look that says he’s afraid that Vernon actually _will_ go off like some wild beast in a lab coat. That look hurts more than Jackson’s acting out ever could.

He steps over his ruined poster and its tarnished first place ribbon to get at his locker and another day of being different and alone.

“You are such a racist asshole!” Stiles is shouting. “I don’t care how popular you are. That’s a hate crime! When Principal Schwatz sees this you are going to get expelled. You know this is California, not Alabama, you can’t just--”

Vernon wants to turn around and shout at him, yell that he doesn’t need a literally white knight to come in and save him from some petty, ignorant asshole like Jackson. He doesn’t need it when he’s had practice at every other kind of racism, when he’s heard worse from the cashier at the 711. He’s heard worse on the _radio_. He’s even had it matter more. Jackson’s tantrum is just words. I won’t affect his life, like how he can’t get any babysitting jobs or how he’s heard teachers call him a ‘lost cause’ when he’s done absolutely nothing wrong or when an old lady will nearly get run over by a truck trying to cross the street to get on the other side from him.

“Why not?” Jackson spits back. “You know he only won because he’s black. Affirmative Action is just an excuse for minorities to be lazy and take places of white kids who work three times as hard because they’re competing for less spaces!”

“Or maybe they don’t want to reward lazy white boys who sit back and let their partner do all the work!” Stiles yells back, getting right up in Jackson’s face. A part of Vernon kind of wants to see what would happen if Jackson decides to use the inches and muscle mass he’s got on Stiles to get him to finally shut his trap. “Do you even know what a Telluric Current is?”

Before Jackson can answer, another voice intrudes. “It’s okay, Jacks. His project was good. And in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not white either. It wasn’t because he’s black.” Jackson’s pet faggot is intervening now, putting a restraining hand on Jackson’s shoulder as the kid turns redder and redder with rage. Vernon remembers how it had felt, wet, being pulled to meet the other boy’s lips against his will, like he was like _that_ , like Danny could force him to be even more of a freak than he already was. Like he could make Vernon’s dad care even less about him than he did already, but turning him into a weak, pathetic, sicko who takes it up the ass.

“Stop it!” Vernon shouts at Danny. “I don’t need you defending me, fag! You can go back to sucking his cock, for all I care.”

Jackson shakes himself loose from Danny, who’s looking down at his shoes, tears in his eyes. Vernon had kept his secret after last summer, because it was his shame, too, but he’s not going to keep it any longer, not if Danny is just going to _pity_ him, even after Vernon pushed him away.

Jackson slams Vernon back against the locker. Even though he’s shorter and lighter, lacrosse has taught him how to really throw his entire bodyweight behind it. Vernon will have a padlock-shaped bruise on his back tomorrow. “Don’t you _ever_ call him that, you stupid, useless, nigg--”

“Jackson Whittemore!” a high pitched voice comes down on the squabble like a commandment. “If you finish that sentence, I will end you.”

Jackson’s grip on Vernon loosens enough that Stiles and Danny are able to pull him back. He straightens his collar, blushing as he takes stock of where Lydia Martin has parted the crowd like Moses parted the sea. 

“Did I get second place because I’m a girl?”

“Lydia, that’s different--” Jackson protests with syrupy contrition.

“Well, did I?” She stomps her heel.

“No, Lydia. Your project was really good. It’s just, he’s not like you and me. He doesn’t deserve--”

“You disgust me,” Lydia says, turning on her heel and walking off. Jackson chases after her, but she just keeps walking.

“That. Was. Awesome!” Stiles exclaims, like Jackson’s racism and Vernon’s pain and Lydia’s refusal to put with it is all just there for his amusement.

The mob dissipates after that. Some teachers are walking down the hall and Lydia has practically dismissed everyone anyway. Vernon already knows there will be some kind of retaliation. Danielle and her clique won’t take hearing that Jackson Whittemore almost called someone a nigger lying down, even if that person was just Vernon. 

There are tears in Vernon’s eyes. He’s not sure if it’s sadness or anger or just frustration that Jackson Whittemore is an asshole and everyone from Stiles to Lydia to Danielle are going to get to do something about it, but Vernon can’t. Well, he didn’t. He should have punched Jackson Whittemore in his smug, stupid, white face, but he didn’t, because what would Gran say? What would his father? What would everyone have said if he broke into a rage like everyone expects him to like a gorilla in a lab coat? He can’t go around punching racist, entitled white boys whose fathers are about to be elected the District Attorney. Who knows what kind of retaliation he’d see then?

When Vernon finally has enough control over his tears to turn, Scott McCall is standing there, sucking on his inhaler with one hand while he holds the poster in the other. “What do you want me to do with this?”

“Throw it out,” Vernon says. That poster could get Jackson Whittemore into a lot of trouble, but the trouble it would cause for Vernon would be even worse.

Scott looks unsure. “I could take it to Principal Schwartz. It wouldn’t come from you.”

“Please, just throw it away.”

Scott nods and lets Vernon retreat in silence.

The hurt fades eventually, especially when Jackson gets pummeled by pretty much every black kid he meets on the lacrosse field and Danielle posts something about him acting out over having a micropenis on her Facebook page, complete with illustrations.

The thing that sticks with Vernon the most, though, is that Lydia Martin had called Jackson out on being a racist, called him disgusting, but two years later, she’s hanging off his arm pretending to be a vapid bimbo just so that so-called disgusting racist can feel better about himself.

***

Watching lacrosse is much less exciting as a werewolf. Maybe it’s the nervous pitter-patter of the heartbeats. Maybe it’s the fact that it looks like child’s play compared to Derek’s training routine. Or that he could win this game singlehandedly in a matter of minutes. Or maybe Vernon just doesn’t _care_ the way he used to. His school’s team is meaningless when he has a real pack now. 

Then Coach Finstock calls him up.

Playing lacrosse is no more interesting than watching it, but for the first time, Vernon feels that the tingle of eyes upon his skin is a good thing. They cheer instead of deride. It’s intoxicating. It’s not the attention, really. It’s not even the way it feels to hear an opponent’s bones crunch with victory. It’s the sudden realization that he doesn’t have to hide. He doesn’t have to worry about how they’ll speculate - about his anger, call him a beast, call him another big, black, faceless kid who will earn his place with his strength but not his humanity. Let them.

He understands the lie, now. No matter what he does, no matter how hard he tries, he won’t ever be accepted. He can’t shed his skin or his circumstance. He’ll be persecuted for his rage, just as he’ll be ridiculed and isolated for his passivity. He was not meant for inclusion into their world. Only the pack will accept him. 

He doesn’t have to walk on eggshells to avoid their fear. He doesn’t have to exaggerate docility to avoid being called a beast. He is a beast, though not the kind they’re thinking of. This isn’t King Kong. Vernon’s beast is sleek and strong and loyal. It prowls in the night. It protects its pack. It’s beautiful.

Vernon wonders briefly, if it is the wolf who gave birth to the rage or if the wolf only gave him permission to feel it. He doubts he’ll ever know.

Across the field, Erica meets his eyes and smiles. Vernon could conquer the world.

***

“Tell me about your sister,” Cora says, tucked up against him, her head on his shoulder.

Vernon shakes his head. Even after all these years, it’s still too painful. It’s better to keep it locked up inside. 

“Fine,” Cora replies. “I’ll go first. My oldest sister was Laura. She was a cheerleader and all the boys at school were in love with her. She signed me up for ballet lessons when she knew my dad had his poker night so he’d let her borrow the car in order to drop me off and she could sneak out on dates.” Vernon smiles at the image. “Someone killed her,” Cora adds, smirking a little a Vernon’s horrified look.

“Then, there’s my twin brother, Jeremy. We thought we had our own language when we were young, but it was actually just wolf barking that the whole pack could understand. He burned to death on the other side of the mountain ash line. I couldn’t get to him.”

“Cora, why are you…” Vernon starts. The glare she shoots him must be some kind of wolf dominance thing, because he doesn’t think he could keep speaking even if he wanted to.

“Then, my little sister, Maggie. She was a surprise baby and a human. She was only three when she died. I don’t think my parents ever even changed her diaper. They made the rest of us take care of her for the most part. I used to love it. I’d dress her up like she was a doll and make Derek take pictures. Oh, yeah, then there’s Derek.”

Vernon takes an interest. He can’t help himself. Derek never shares anything and Vernon has always wanted to know more. Cora grins. “So, my big brother. How’s he as an alpha?”

They’re probably going to die here, so Vernon lies. “He’s a great alpha.”

Cora actually laughs, squeezing his hand tighter, her tone sardonic. “I can hear your heartbeat, genius. But you’re loyal. That’s sweet. I’m glad my brother has that.”

“He really isn’t that bad.”

Cora raises her eyebrows.

Okay, so maybe Derek hasn’t made a single right decision, starting with biting them and everything that came after. Vernon still _likes_ him, even after all that. “He’s a good man,” Vernon settles on. “And he’s a strong alpha. He just doesn’t take to leadership naturally.”

Cora snorts. “That much, I already knew. Derek was never supposed to be alpha.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Mom was grooming Laura as her second. Jeremy next, then me, then Derek.”

“Why was he last?”

Cora shakes her head. “Every reason. Derek was always really sensitive. He was always self-conscious about what people thought about him, desperate to please. He’d second guess himself about everything. And he was just too emotional. He cried reading me Little Women.”

“Isn’t Little Women supposed to be sad?”

Cora rolls her eyes. “Laura read me The Stand. Derek is such a nerd.”

“How old were you?”

“Seven.” That explains a lot about Cora, at least. “You know, Derek failed every single leadership exercise mom ever gave him? But that’s a good thing.”

“What? Why?”

“Because he’s going to find us. He failed every problem because Derek never, ever quits while he’s ahead.”

They grin at each other a little, basking in the hope. 

“Now, tell me about your sister,” Cora prompts. “I told you my sad story. Now you tell me yours.”

Vernon takes a deep breath. It’s a hard story. That’s probably why he’s never told it. He wouldn’t tell it at all, except Erica is dead and despite Cora’s optimism, Boyd’s probably soon to be. If there’s any chance she makes it out of this alive, someone needs to know about Alicia, at least the things only Vernon knows, the things he’s kept to himself.

“Alicia was beautiful--” he starts.

***

“Tell me a story,” Alicia says. Vernon is pulling her hair into pigtails, using the ties with the beads to keep it from poofing out in the center. Vernon is happy their mom isn’t around, otherwise Alicia would be begging to try relaxer like their mom uses. It’s her new favorite thing to whine about and Vernon hates it. In fact, he hates doing Alicia’s hair, because he’s a boy and boys don’t do hair, but mom says that he needs to, in order to be a good brother and a good son. She promises not to tell his father that Vernon helps her like this sometimes.

“Once upon a time,” Vernon begins.

“No! A true story.”

Vernon sighs. Alicia is in one of _those_ moods. “Okay, a true story.”

Alicia nods, messing up one of Vernon’s pigtails.

“This is the story about a family.”

This has Alicia’s interest. She sits still in anticipation while Vernon tries to figure out how he managed to section the hair so crooked. 

“There was a mommy and a daddy who loved each other very much.”

“What did they look like?”

“They were tall and they had the most beautiful smiles and everything they wore was made out of gold.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“The father was a warrior. He fought.”

“Who’d he fight? The terrorists?”

“No.”

“Who?”

“Monsters. He was really strong and really fast and he would do anything to protect his family. He would die to protect his family.”

“Like daddy?” 

Not like Vernon’s daddy, who fought for his country, but never for his family. Not like Clarence either, who’d never fought for anything in his life, but Alicia didn’t need to know that about her father. “Yeah, just like daddy.”

“And he had a daughter, right? Like me?”

“Just like you. She was the prettiest girl in the whole town. Everybody loved her.”

“I’m not the prettiest. That’s Britt Northrup. Everybody says so.”

“Well, she was prettier than Britt Northrup.”

“Was her name Alicia?”

“Yeah, her name was Alicia.”

“And her father? What was his name?”

“Vernon,” Vernon says, because Clarence isn’t the hero of this story. He’s not the hero of anything. Vernon is a name you live up to. It’s a hero’s name.

“That’s your name!”

That’s not what the other children call him. The other children call him Boyd.

The End

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [vernon boyd vs. the infinite sadness](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1842583) by [la_loba](https://archiveofourown.org/users/la_loba/pseuds/la_loba)




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